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It’s been a week since the un-Nobeled President Trump blew his no-more-foreign-wars pledge to Tehran and back. I heard myself swearing at Pete Hegseth the same way my dad swore at President Johnson every time more soldiers with good feet were sent to Vietnam.

I’m not alone. I wasn’t even the first critic to call it Trump’s “Epstein War.”

I’d winnowed possible titles for this column down to “When the Epstein War is Over” when my neighbor called me. She asked if I could drive her to the pharmacy after her prescription was filled.

I headed out to shovel last night’s 10 inches of snow off of our driveway. I planned to ponder the “When” as I shoveled and also the “how.”

We Americans must figure out how to sew the nation back together when Donald Trump heads to the exits. My own thoughts are hot enough that they do not auger well for reconciliation.

After I headed out, I could see the fellow who had painted our house last year shoveling my neighbor’s driveway. He was fulfilling a promise to our neighbor to keep her shoveled out – at no charge! He’s done it for two years. What a mensch. That’s Yiddish for a person of integrity, honor, and high moral character.

We shovelers waved at each other and shouted cheerfully over the occasional traffic.

After we’d been at it a while a loud insistent beep, beep, beep, beeeeeeeep caught my attention. The driver of a charcoal-colored SUV heading downhill clearly wanted me to see him. He gave me the bird.
I’d seen several irate drivers at the intersection of Lake and Superior streets flash their middle digits at No King’s protesters. I figured the same politics was involved. Sadly, this time I had no one else to share the honor with. I shouted to my fellow shoveler. “I just got the bird.”

“Why,” he asked.

“Probably because he doesn’t like my criticism of Donald Trump,” I replied.

Thirty-five years ago, Christian kids called me a “baby killer” at a Republican convention.

By the time I was painting the railing above my retaining wall 22 years ago I was only a little surprised when a guy stopped to shout, “You’re a spineless bastard Welty.” 

Like today, it prompted a Reader column on July 11, 2003. I titled it “HW4SB.” You can find it at snowbizz.com. The acronym stood for “Harry Welty for Spineless Bastard.” My crime was supporting our Superintendent when he replaced a high school hockey coach.

My Uncle Frank was in town for my daughter’s wedding when that Reader was published. He thought the column was funny.

Sometimes I claw myself back into people’s good graces. A couple weeks ago some Bulldog hockey neighbors asked me if I’d help honor the passing of a beloved UMD fan. I was delighted, so long as “Hoagie” Haagenson sat on his fellow Bulldog’s lawn. It was a treat to get friendly words instead of catcalls from the hockey crowd.

Lately, I’ve been reading David McCullough’s Pulitzer-winning biography Truman. I’m about half way through its 1,000 pages. What has struck me about it is the absolute miracle that put an ordinary nice guy into the Presidency and the Democrats and Republicans both cheering his common sense and decency. Oh, how we have fallen.

Today something like 40 percent of Republicans think Democrats are immoral and an even higher 70% of Democrats think the same of Republicans.

When I was a kid most Americans didn’t think there was much difference between the two parties. If you tried to show their differences with the two circles of a Venn diagram, the circles would mostly overlap except for two thin edges on the fringe.

The people overlapping themselves could vote either Democrat or Republican. The thin edges on the far sides were what Teddy Roosevelt called the “lunatic fringe.”

Today the two circles barely touch each other so that most voters are in the lunatic fringe. I mostly blame Republicans, like the ones who said I murdered babies, more than I blame Democrats.

Add the news silos created by billionaires with lunatic “group-think” content and the algorithms of Facebook, Instagram etc. that drive people away from content that they disagree with and you get America divided.

The mensch finished his side and joined me before the charcoal SUV headed back up the hill. This time when the driver flashed his middle finger it blinded two of us.

I’m counting on Donald Trump to bring America back together. How will he do it? By disappointing and possibly embarrassing his supporters over affordability, tariffs, forever wars and Jeffery Epstein.

Winston Churchill, who makes an appearance in the Truman book, once said of the United States, “You can always count on Americans to do the right thing - after they’ve tried everything else.”

If so, then just maybe the driver of that charcoal-colored SUV and I will be able to holster our fingers someday.

Harry Welty also pops off at lincolndemocrat.com.